Comments on: Poetry Saturdays: Mary Oliverhttp://www.harpyness.com/2010/10/02/poetry-saturdays-mary-oliver/
As narrated by the most charming and vicious women on the internetFri, 16 Jan 2015 17:30:59 +0000hourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=3.8.5By: Adrienne Lambhttp://www.harpyness.com/2010/10/02/poetry-saturdays-mary-oliver/comment-page-1/#comment-35220
Tue, 12 Oct 2010 20:04:14 +0000http://www.harpyness.com/?p=17202#comment-35220Thank you for reminding me of Mary Oliver, and to the poster above, I also love “Wild Geese.”

There is a labyrinth in my town, a circular walk modeled after the one in the cathedral at Chartres. It is surrounded by benches, each fronted by a quote in the ground. The one from Mary Oliver says: “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” After my husband left me, I buried my wedding ring in the dirt beside it.

Here is another of my favorite Oliver poems:

The Journey

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice–
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do–
determined to save
the only life you could save.

When I first read her, it was “Spring Azures” for a class. I was sitting on my couch reading it and halfway through I just lost it. There’s something about that poem that speaks to me. She’s spectacular.

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.